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Booking a holiday when paying off debt
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EvaCustard wrote: »If she is doing the right thing for her & still meeting her financial committments, who are we to judge?
Not judging, just offering my take which I am entitled to.
Surely the right thing is paying her debts on time every month. What she does with the rest of her money is her choice.
My take is she was hoping to salve her conscience which many of you I'm sure will have helped to do.
I do hope you will be just as quick to offer practical help if her debts are compounded by this self indulgent approach to life.
Get a grip.
A holiday is wonderful AFTER you have cleared your debts - ALL of them.0 -
Hello there,
Take the holiday and enjoy it!!.... but keep a careful eye on the budget whilst you're there. Set a budget and stick to it....NO excuses.... why not incentivise yourselves by keeping enough in reserve to have a nice take-away-meal/bottle of wine on the night you get back home when you don't want to go shopping/cooking?
Try thinking of your debt as a prison sentence..... sooner or later, if you carry on doing the right thing then your sentence will be over. Good behaviour/stringent financial planning earns remission ie: early release from debts.
I've been up to my eyebrows in debt in the past, but eventually I came out the other end. It took a lot of hard work and solitary confinement (in the sense of staying at home and not going out when I really wanted to). I went without central heating through two very harsh winters (2010-11 and 2011-12) by putting on more clothes. I was forced to relent a bit during the endless winter of 2012-13:-((
Don't beat yourself up by thinking you don't deserve some cake after such a lengthy diet:-)) Go and enjoy your holiday; I'm sure you now have the ingrained discipline to keep an eye on the finances, and where and when to see the bargains.
Cheers
Gerrag0 -
flossy_splodge wrote: »of course what she does with her money is her choice...HOWEVER, if she didn't have doubts she probably wouldn't have come on here asking the question.
My take is she was hoping to salve her conscience which many of you I'm sure will have helped to do.
I do hope you will be just as quick to offer practical help if her debts are compounded by this self indulgent approach to life.
Get a grip.
A holiday is wonderful AFTER you have cleared your debts - ALL of them.
Excuse me - get a grip yourself - there is no need to be quite so rude and yes you are judging - the tone of your responses indicates that.
Oh, and I notice you have changed your signature.0 -
I take the holidays. I went six years without a holiday, and I really missed it.
I found that all I was doing, in order to save money, was going to work, going to the gym, and going home.
That whole lifestyle was depressing, and lonely. I won't go back there again.0 -
Yes, take a holiday, would be my advice.
It seems that you have have a realistic grip on your debt management, as shown by the fact that you are feeling a little guilty about even considering taking a holiday.:)
A couple of budget suggestions based on experience would be;
a) holiday park offers through local papers, e.g Breakfree which has tie-ins with some regional papers
http://www.breakfreeholidays.co.uk/local
You will probably find the passwords elsewhere on this forum (or if someone can point us in the right direction?)
I've been on a couple of these in the past, and they are excellent value; the last one was a week on the Dorset coast in May, just over £100 in total for 4 people - or £3.50 per person per day.
b) late deals at high street travel agents; if you have the nerve (some people don't like leaving decisions to the last minute), go into a high st travel agent a couple of days before your time off, and see what deals they have; particularly good if you don't mind where you go, and you can go from different airports. So, as an example, if you were to go in today, ask where they could send you on holiday this Saturday. I've had a week in the Canary Islands, flights and accommodation, for less than £100.'It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.'
Groucho Marx
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just thought I'd let you know....some great deals today on 2bookaholiday.com0
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Hello - we are not in debt but have a very large savings goal which we have been focussed on for 3 years. I felt like a holiday was key to keeping us motivated and on track as we live frugally despite both working full time and on above average salaries .... but my husband felt like this was delaying us getting to our savings target. He has come around to the idea now (and is really looking forward to it!) that I managed to show how we could still get to where we wanted to be with our savings (a month out) by carefully building in some 'give' to our savings plan and doing it on the cheap. We found cheap flights with Ryanair.com - and then got a swanky brand new self catering apartment with pool through ownersdirect.co.uk on the Algarve late September for £300 for the week. Word of advice - if going down the self catering route take note of transfer distances to the airport and how much that will cost - and that the accomodation doesn't require car rental - that you can walk to shops to get groceries etc. This plus 1 weeks airport parking is coming to £650 for the week for both of us and then I guess we'll be spending £100 on groceries for the week - not much more than we would at home anyway.
I think the key to us getting to this point was that we both worked out how we could make the holiday happen and how it would fit with our over all budgeting plans ... good luck with making it happen and enjoy your break away.0 -
If being debt free isn't going to be in the near future, (or a holiday isn't something you can wait for) I'd also suggest going, if you don't think the guilt will mar your enjoyment. The key is planning, planning and more planning (before purchase). Go all inclusive to reduce the surprise costs of food and drink. Set a realistic amount of money for each days spending, but not too restricted that you're worrying about the money the whole time. (If it's all-incl, it shouldn't really be too much.)
When it comes to holidays, you really should research EVERYTHING first. Use websites like trivago and lastminute and travel zoo, they source really excellent deals. Even secret escapes sometimes have something at an astounding price, (look for all inclusive with flights and airport transfers) If you find a place you like, tripadvisor it FIRST! Also if there are alot of deals for one place, find out why. Are there riots? Is it monsoon season?
Plan the physical trip in your head, sometimes costs like taxis to and from the airport can be unexpected. The cheaper flights are at silly o'clock in the morning or night, but one time, we were totally caught off guard because we saved a good £90 on an early flight back to the UK, completely forgetting that trains wouldn't run from Gatwick at that time of night. The taxi cost us £70, and we didn't enjoy the hotel for the final night's sleep, as we just went straight to the airport at midnight. The saving was really not worth it.
Sorry to lecture! I'm sure you know alot of this already, I really enjoy saving money on holidays, the sun shines brighter if I paid less of the cost to get it!
Oh, one more thing. Pay for the holiday with YOUR OWN money, not the bank's money. By all means put it on the credit card, if your bank account can pay it back in the next 2 months, or something."The thing about quotes on the internet is that you cannot confirm their validity." ~ Abraham Lincoln0 -
You asked for places to get good holidays...
We are using Sykes Cottages to get away, two family's (9 people) and we are paying £280 a family for a week. We used them for our honeymoon and a holiday previously, and off season they are great prices.
Yes it's in the UK, but you save money on not flying and self catering means you can use your normal grocery budget for most your meals and then treat yourself to a special meal with the money you saved instead.
Highly recommendedWe spend money we don't have, on things that we don't need, to impress people we don't like. I don't and I'm happy!:dance: Mortgage Free Wannabe :dance:Overpayments Made: £5400 - Interest Saved: £11,550 - Months Saved: 240 -
I agree with everyone. If you've worked hard to pay off your debts, why shouldn't you have a holiday
BF wants us to take the kids to Florida next year... We managed to take them to turkey A.I this year without getting In anymore debt, He is not realistic with that suggestion!! :rotfl: When I'm debt free, I will save up and it'll be the first holiday we go on though.... Will also be my 30th :eek:
You sound like you're very disciplined so I'm sure you'll get back to saving and paying the debt off when you get back :TSavings target: £10,000 by December 2015!Total so far: £3470.00 = 34.7%
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